[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 146 (Thursday, September 19, 2024)]
[House]
[Pages H5505-H5507]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               ENHANCED PRESIDENTIAL SECURITY ACT OF 2024

  Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the 
bill (H.R. 9106) to direct the Director of the United States Secret 
Service to apply the same standards for determining the number of 
agents required to protect Presidents, Vice Presidents, and major 
Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates, and for other purposes, 
as amended.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The text of the bill is as follows:

                               H.R. 9106

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Enhanced Presidential 
     Security Act of 2024''.

     SEC. 2. UNIFORM STANDARDS FOR SECRET SERVICE PROTECTION OF 
                   PRESIDENTS, VICE PRESIDENTS, AND MAJOR 
                   PRESIDENTIAL AND VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES.

       The Director of the United States Secret Service shall 
     apply the same standards for determining the number of agents 
     required to protect Presidents, Vice Presidents, and major 
     Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates.

     SEC. 3. REPORT.

       Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of this 
     Act, the Director of the United States Secret Service shall 
     conduct a comprehensive review of the provision of protection 
     by the Secret Service for Presidents, Vice Presidents, former 
     Presidents, and major Presidential and Vice Presidential 
     candidates, and submit to the Committee on the Judiciary of 
     the House of Representatives and the Committee on the 
     Judiciary of the Senate a report that includes the findings 
     from such review, along with any recommendations for 
     improving the provision of protection.

     SEC. 4. DEFINITION.

       In this Act, the term ``major Presidential and Vice 
     Presidential candidates'' has the meaning given such term in 
     section 3056 of title 18, United States Code, and includes 
     any other Presidential or Vice Presidential candidate for 
     whom the President has otherwise authorized the Secret 
     Service to protect.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Moran). Pursuant to the rule, the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Jordan) and the gentleman from New York (Mr. 
Nadler) each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Ohio.


                             General Leave

  Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may 
have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and 
include extraneous material on H.R. 9106.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Ohio?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Lawler), my friend, who is the sponsor of 
this critical legislation.
  Mr. LAWLER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding.
  In America, elections are determined at the ballot box, not by an 
assassin's bullet.
  In recent months, we have seen two such attempts on the life of 
former President Donald Trump: first in Pennsylvania, and most recently 
in Florida.
  That these incidents were allowed to occur is a stain on our country. 
We have endured through assassinations of political leaders, including 
Presidents. It is destructive to our country. It is destructive to our 
democracy, our constitutional Republic, and it undermines the 
confidence that Americans have in their government and in the electoral 
process.
  But for a millimeter's difference, Donald Trump would be dead. But 
for a millimeter's difference, an assassin would have upended our 
election. Regardless of how every American feels, regardless of how 
every American intends to vote, it is the right of the American people 
to determine the outcome of this election.
  The idea that our election could be decided by an assassin's bullet 
should shake the conscience of our Nation, and it requires swift action 
by the Federal Government. It requires Congress to ensure that the 
Secret Service provides the same level of protection as it does to the 
President of the United States to the leading candidates for President. 
In this case, they are former President Trump and Vice President 
Harris.
  Either one of them is going to be President come January 20, 2025, 
and the American people should get to make that choice.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. Torres) for 
assisting in immediately moving to introduce this legislation in the 
aftermath of the first assassination attempt on Donald Trump.
  It is shocking that it took a second assassination attempt for Donald 
Trump to get the same level of protective detail from the Secret 
Service as the President of the United States. It shouldn't have come 
to that, which is all the more reason why this bill is necessary. It 
will ensure that this never happens again and that the Secret Service 
conduct an immediate review to determine what resources are

[[Page H5506]]

needed, what personnel is needed, and report immediately back to 
Congress.
  This will ensure that every candidate running for President gets the 
same level of protective detail as the current President and that the 
same level of protective detail afforded to the Vice President is 
afforded to the Vice-Presidential candidate.

                              {time}  1745

  We have a responsibility to ensure their safety and their well-being.
  I also commend my colleagues, Congressman   Mike Kelly and Jason 
Crow, who are leading the House Task Force on the Attempted 
Assassination of Donald J. Trump. Their work to investigate this 
incident and the detailed shortcomings within the Secret Service will 
certainly help Congress implement further meaningful reforms in the 
future and ensure the funding and resources are available.
  I think the most important thing for the American people to 
understand is that it is the responsibility of the government to ensure 
that our elections are free, fair, and decided by the American people 
at the ballot box, and that any attempt, either by a foreign government 
or by a fellow citizen, to undermine that by trying to assassinate a 
political candidate must be stopped at all costs.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank Speaker Johnson, Leader Scalise, and Chairman 
Jordan for swiftly moving to advance this legislation to the floor for 
a vote. I encourage every single one of my colleagues, regardless of 
their political views, regardless of whether they like or dislike one 
of the candidates, to recognize the fundamental fact that we have a 
responsibility to ensure their safety and well-being and let the 
American people decide who will be President, not an assassin and not 
an assassin's bullet.
  Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, H.R. 9106, the Enhanced Presidential Security Act of 
2024, requires the Secret Service to apply the same standards for 
determining the number of agents required to protect Presidents, Vice 
Presidents, and major Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates.
  It also directs the Secret Service to conduct a review of the 
provision of protection provided to these individuals and to report its 
findings and recommendations to Congress.
  I support this legislation to ensure that the Secret Service has the 
tools, resources, and procedures necessary to keep our highest elected 
officials and candidates safe, which is critical to our democratic 
system of government.
  In advancing this legislation, Republicans are hoping to distract 
from the common denominator in every successful assassination of a U.S. 
President, as well as the attempted assassination of President Reagan 
and the attempted assassination of former Presidents and Presidential 
candidates Theodore Roosevelt and Donald Trump. In every single one of 
these events, the weapon used was a gun.
  The fact is that the work of the Secret Service is made infinitely 
more difficult by our lax gun laws.
  This Congress, the Republican majority has repeatedly sought to 
further weaken our gun laws, endangering our children, our law 
enforcement officers, our communities, and even their own Presidential 
candidate.
  Last year, after a mass shooter killed six people, including three 
children, at a school in Nashville, Republicans fought to make sure 
everyone could continue to acquire the accessory that shooter used in 
circumvention of the National Firearms Act.
  Earlier this year, our Republican colleagues cheered as the Supreme 
Court, stacked with Republican nominees, struck down the regulation of 
bump stocks, allowing the accessory used in the deadliest mass shooting 
in U.S. history to again be available to the public without even a 
background check.
  When the Senate tried to bring up legislation to again regulate bump 
stocks, Senate Republicans blocked it. Similar legislation in the House 
has just one Republican cosponsor, and the Republican majority has 
refused to advance it.
  Just today, Republicans used their control of the Judiciary Committee 
to advance a bill that would weaken the Bipartisan Safer Communities 
Act, reinvigorate the black market for guns, and reopen the online and 
private sale loophole. That legislation would make it so that convicted 
felons, domestic abusers, and other dangerous persons who are 
prohibited from possessing a gun could easily get one without a 
background check. It would make it so that unlicensed sellers could, 
once again, profit from endangering our communities.
  It doesn't stop there. Not only have they sought to unravel our gun 
laws through legislation and our courts, but our Republican colleagues 
have also sought to defund the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, 
and Explosives, the primary agency tasked with enforcing our gun laws, 
including by helping State and local law enforcement solve violent 
crimes and keep guns out of the wrong hands.
  The cumulative effect of these efforts is clear. We know from 
headline after headline that it is far too easy for violent individuals 
to get a gun and end a life or many lives in a matter of seconds. That 
is true whether the attacker targets schoolchildren, a domestic 
partner, a house of worship, or a Presidential candidate.
  The challenges faced by the Secret Service would be vastly diminished 
if we passed any one of our many proposals to keep guns out of the 
wrong hands, but over and over, Republicans have prioritized access to 
deadly weapons over the safety of our communities.
  I support this legislation because the Secret Service must be able to 
protect our highest elected officials and candidates, but this 
legislation will do nothing to make the rest of us any safer or change 
the fact that gun violence continues to take the lives of more than 100 
Americans every single day.
  As Republicans yet again rush headlong toward a government shutdown, 
unable to even manage the most basic aspects of governing, and as they 
continue to oppose every action to prevent gun violence, Democrats will 
continue to fight to make our communities safer for every American.
  Mr. Speaker, I nonetheless urge my colleagues to support this modest 
legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, let me get this straight. Some crazy guy on 
the left tries to assassinate President Trump, and it is Republicans' 
fault? That is what we just heard.
  Next thing they are going to say is, oh, some crazy guy on the left 
tries to assassinate President Trump, and it is President Trump's 
fault. Oh, wait a minute. They said that, too.
  This is ridiculous. We have a bipartisan bill that Representative 
Lawler went to Democrats to work with them on, something that everyone 
knows needs to happen, and what does the ranking member do? He says it 
is Republicans' fault. What do Democrats do? What does the left do? 
They say it is President Trump's fault. You cannot make this stuff up.
  After all that President Trump has been through, they go to that. 
After they spied on his campaign, after Mueller, after impeachment, 
after they raided his home, after they tried the crazy 14th Amendment 
idea that the best way to beat him is not let him play the game, not 
let him go on the ballot--thank goodness the Supreme Court decided 9-0 
that was bogus. That is what they do.
  I wasn't even going to talk. I was going to let Mr. Lawler, who has 
done the work on this, handle all this. His remarks were totally 
bipartisan, not partisan at all. I was just going to let this good 
piece of legislation that is going to go on suspension--everyone is 
going to vote for it--just let it happen, but no, they cannot help 
themselves. It is ridiculous.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman 
from New York (Mr. Lawler), who is working in the proper fashion on a 
good piece of legislation that will protect, as he indicated in his 
opening remarks, both former President Trump and Vice President Harris. 
That is what we want in America.
  Mr. LAWLER. Mr. Speaker, on the issue of gun violence in America, I 
think about New York and the disastrous cashless bail law, which was 
put into effect and supported by the ranking member and continues to be 
supported by the ranking member, in which more than 80 percent of perps 
who are carrying and using a gun are released back out onto the street.

[[Page H5507]]

  I will quote New York City Mayor Eric Adams: ``When it comes to guns, 
this year, 2,386 people were arrested with a gun. Of those, 
approximately 1,921 are out on the street.''
  Eric Adams went on to say:
  ``Arrested with a gun, out on the street.''
  ``Gun arrests in custody, 19.5 percent. Out of custody, over 80 
percent.''
  ``How do you take a gun law seriously when the overwhelming numbers 
are back on the streets after carrying a gun?''
  Eric Adams says very clearly that you can't take it seriously when 
you refuse to prosecute people who use guns in the commission of a 
crime.
  So many of my colleagues in New York have been so clueless about 
this. They talk about gun violence, but they have no problem allowing a 
criminal using guns in the commission of a crime to be put back on the 
street to do it again and again. It is wrong.
  If you want to crack down on gun violence in America, then prosecute 
criminals who use guns in the commission of a crime, but no, we don't 
want to do that.
  New York raised the age so 16- and 17-year-olds are being treated in 
family court rather than criminal court, and the gangs are using them, 
letting them use guns in the commission of a crime because they know 
they are going to get a slap on the wrist.
  Let's get serious about gun violence in America. Let's crack down on 
criminals who actually use guns in the commission of a crime.
  Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, this Nation is awash in guns. It is the only 
Nation where we have, time after time after time, school shootings, 
where we aren't even surprised at mass shooting events in schools. We 
are the only Nation that has mass shooting events because of our lax 
gun laws, because we are awash in guns.
  Mr. Lawler says we should prosecute people who use guns in crimes. I 
agree. We certainly should. We certainly should do that, and if the 
people of New York aren't, they should. I can't comment on the New York 
laws. I haven't been in the legislature in 32 years. Mr. Lawler has 
been there more recently.
  The fact of the matter is, this country is awash in guns, and Mr. 
Jordan says that a left-winger attempted to assassinate former 
President Trump. We don't know that. The person who attempted to 
assassinate him, we know, researched the whereabouts of former 
President Trump. He researched the whereabouts of President Biden. He 
seemed to want to kill somebody, and the evidence seems to point out 
that the reason he attacked Trump and not Biden was because Trump was 
holding a rally near where he was. However, the fact is he is dead, and 
we don't know. We certainly don't know his political opinions.
  In any event, this country is awash in guns.
  While this bill is a good bill, we should equally protect our 
Presidential candidates, whether they are the incumbent President or 
the would-be President and Vice-Presidential candidates. The fact is 
that Presidential candidates and all of us are less safe because this 
country is awash in guns, and it is the only country in the world--I 
shouldn't say that--there are countries where genocide is being 
committed, like Darfur in Sudan, but it is one of the only countries in 
the world awash in guns.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. 
Torres), the cosponsor of this bill.
  Mr. TORRES of New York. Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for 
yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, I am proud to partner with my colleague, the gentleman 
from New York (Mr. Lawler), on a matter of urgent importance to our 
Nation.
  The United States is entering an age of ever-escalating political 
violence, as evidenced by the violent assault on the United States 
Capitol on January 6 and as evidenced by not one but two attempted 
assassinations of a former President.
  On July 13, the difference between an attempted assassination and a 
completed assassination was not the skill of the Secret Service. It was 
luck.

  If the gunman had been slightly more precise in his shooting, or if 
the former President had moved ever so slightly to his right, the 
former President would have been killed. The fact that America stood 
inches and seconds away from a national crisis is itself a crisis.
  The security of a major Presidential candidate, whether it be 
Democratic nominee Vice President Harris or Republican nominee former 
President Donald Trump, cannot be left to chance.

                              {time}  1800

  Hoping for the best and lucking out is not a policy prescription for 
protecting a President or a Presidential candidate.
  Both the House and the Senate, both Democrats and Republicans, should 
be dedicated to a bipartisan, bicameral proposition that both major 
Presidential candidates of both parties are entitled to the highest 
level of Secret Service protection, not only for their sake, but for 
our Nation's.
  One final point is that the Secret Service urgently needs not only 
more resources but also deeper structural reforms. Only 30 percent of 
the Secret Service budget is dedicated to protective operations. The 
remaining 70 percent is spent on legacy functions that trace back to 
the Secret Service's time in the Treasury Department.
  The role the Secret Service plays in financial law enforcement does 
not reflect a rational allocation of resources and responsibilities. It 
is an accident of history and a relic of the past that should be 
reexamined by the United States Congress.
  Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close, and I yield myself 
the balance of my time.
  Mr. Speaker, once again, the Federal Government is just as it was 
this same time last year, on the brink of shutting down, threatening to 
cut off essential services for millions of Americans.
  Instead of addressing the real needs of the American people, 
Republicans have spent this week spreading misinformation about 
immigrants, attempting to hide from their own record on reproductive 
care, and evading their responsibility to govern.
  In bringing up this legislation, they seek to distract the American 
people from the fact that their own actions have repeatedly made every 
American, from Presidential candidates to schoolchildren, more at risk 
of gun violence.
  When Democrats take back the House, we will work to make everyone in 
this Nation safer, but for today, I urge Members to support this 
legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on this commonsense, 
good legislation that is designed to protect our Presidential 
candidates, and I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Jordan) that the House suspend the rules and 
pass the bill, H.R. 9016, as amended.
  The question was taken.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds 
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
  Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further 
proceedings on this motion will be postponed.

                          ____________________